Casey joins wave of Dems; Toomey says call ‘inappropriate’
WASHINGTON – Add U.S. Sen. Bob Casey to the cascade of Democrats now supporting the newly launched impeachment inquiry against President Donald Trump.
Until now the Pennsylvania legislator stayed on the sidelines as fellow Democrats called for an impeachment probe, declaring that he needed to remain impartial because he would need to vote if an impeachment investigation proceeded to a Senate trial.
But on Wednesday, after the White House released a memo detailing a call in which Trump repeatedly prodded Ukraine’s new leader to investigate political rival Joe Biden, Casey said there was “new urgency to take action.”
“It is as clear as day that this is an abuse of power,” Casey said during a call with reporters. “No one looking at these facts could say otherwise.”
Pennsylvania’s other U.S. senator, Republican Pat Toomey agreed that the conversation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy was “inappropriate” — but not impeachable, saying it revealed “no quid pro quo.”
“While the conversation reported in the memorandum relating to alleged Ukrainian corruption and Vice President Biden’s son was inappropriate, it does not rise to the level of an impeachable offense,” Toomey said in a written statement.
The senators’ comments came a day after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced the beginning of a formal impeachment inquiry on Trump’s interactions with the Ukrainian president. In that call, one piece of a whistleblower complaint sent to congressional intelligence committees Wednesday, Trump raised allegations that Biden sought to interfere with a Ukrainian prosecutor’s investigation of his son Hunter, according to the White House memo.
The president also urged Zelenskiy to work with the U.S. attorney general and Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, to investigate Biden’s son.
Casey said it was “totally objectionable” for Trump to talk to a foreign leader about a political opponent as he did. (Casey has endorsed Biden in next year’s election, but says that is separate from his support for impeachment.) Casey also was critical of Trump mentioning his personal lawyer as he did during the official call, and of asking the Ukrainian leader “to do us a favor.”
“If there isn’t a law against this, we need a damn law,” Casey said.
Casey announced his support for impeachment in a lengthy statement that included footnotes to news articles, the Mueller report, and reports from previous impeachment cases.
He said he had been attempting to assess whether Trump’s conduct meets the bar for impeachable offenses. The recent revelations, Casey said, represent “a textbook abuse of power.”
“My concerns about the president’s conduct have grown over months, particularly as I thoroughly reviewed Special Counsel Mueller’s report,” Casey said in the statement Wednesday afternoon. “President Trump’s most recent actions with regard to Ukraine have created new urgency to take action.”
Other congressional Democrats also have felt that urgency. A swell of House Democrats added their names to the list of those supporting impeachment proceedings in recent days, as additional details have trickled out regarding the whistleblower complaint.
Rep. Susan Wild, D-Lehigh Valley, who was among swingdistrict Democrats previously reluctant to support impeachment, also shifted her stance this week. Wild said after the memo’s release Wednesday that “an impeachment inquiry is the only way to get all the facts the American people deserve to have.”
House Republicans, including Rep. Dan Meuser, whose district includes Carbon and Schuylkill counties, have blasted the probe as politically motivated.
“It’s clear that there was no quid pro quo and that it was reasonable for them to discuss the potential corruption that may have transpired between the former vice president and Ukraine,” Meuser said. “The Democrats believe this justifies impeachment. I do not agree and I’m quite sure any reasonable American, Republican or Democrat, does not agree either.”
Many details of how the impeachment probe will proceed in the House remain unclear, and Casey declined Wednesday to forecast what may come from the inquiry.
Despite his clear position that Trump’s action merits an impeachment probe, Casey said he still believes he could fulfill his role as a juror in a potential Senate impeachment trial.
That would require him to decide on whether to convict and remove the president, which Casey said would be a different question than whether to begin investigating.